Maria Pappas is an internationally recognized psychologist, experienced lawyer and government reformer who was recruited in 1998 to run for Cook County treasurer at a time when the office was mired in inefficiency and waste.

 

After winning election, Pappas discovered an office in disarray, with $30 million in uncashed checks sitting on the floor, four computers and no system of financial auditing in place. The need for improvement was urgent, and it was no small job.

 

Cook County, with a population of 5.2 million racially and ethnically diverse people, is the second-largest county in the United States. Chicago, the nation’s third-largest city, is in Cook County, as are more than 90 smaller, suburban communities. The county is in the State of Illinois, which has the world’s 19th largest economy and is home to 2,000 foreign-based companies.

 

The Treasurer’s Office handles more than $22 billion in government funds annually, including some $18 billion in property taxes collected on nearly 1.8 million pieces of property. It distributes those tax collections to 2,200 local government agencies throughout the county.

 

Fixing the broken, behemoth office was a daunting task for someone raised in a small coal-mining town in West Virginia by Greek-American parents. But she tackled the job with the same zeal she had exhibited in her earlier professional endeavors, with the aim of making a positive difference. Today, her office is lauded for its efficiency, transparency and deep-dive research studies, including a long-running effort to highlight growing, unsustainable local government debt that includes ballooning unfunded pension liabilities. Pappas has embraced artificial intelligence (AI) technology to advance automation, reduce backlogs and improve customer service.

 

Pappas' reputation for technological savvy and understanding of local sensitivities caught the attention of foreign governments. Many have visited to see how she does what she does. She has shown China how to develop a property tax system and to network hospitals. She has consulted with Greece on issues involving criminal justice, taxation and general automation. And she has spoken to parliaments and groups in Greece, Poland, Mexico and the Dominican Republic. Her theme is "On the Frontier of the Property Tax System."

 

Pappas addressed an audience of government officials representing 127 countries during a global forum in Spain. She hosted a meeting of more than a dozen nations of the Organization of American States, describing her office's data and technology sophistication, and showing her visitors Chicago. Pappas spoke to 250 mayors from North and South America at the Cities Summit of the Americas in Denver, Colorado.

 

When she took office, Pappas turned to computer automation, setting in motion a series of improvements that continue to this day. The results? A paperless, mostly virtual office that better serves taxpayers, spends just 23% of the money in real dollars that it did 26 years ago, funds all but 5% of its costs with commercial user fees, needs only one-quarter of the staff and requires far less space.

 

Meanwhile, she’s expanded the office’s services, all of which can be found on a state-of-the-art website — www.cookcountytreasurer.com — with documents translated into more than 130 languages. That website draws about 1 million visitors a month.

 

The Pappas Studies have detailed outsized and irresponsible government borrowing practices, shown how property tax collections have grown faster than inflation or wages and documented how Cook County’s system of restoring abandoned and vacant properties has failed. She created a think tank that informed policy initiatives that led to historic legislation that slashed interest rates on late taxes from 18% to 9% per year. The reforms are designed to help families keep their homes and build generational wealth.